Maybe follow this guide?
Bouns is it'll install less bloat then the default creative ones as well

Guide: Installing Windows 9x and DOS drivers on Sound Blaster Live! cards (version 3.1)

chinny22 wrote on 2024-10-13, 23:50:

Maybe follow this guide?
Bouns is it'll install less bloat then the default creative ones as well

Guide: Installing Windows 9x and DOS drivers on Sound Blaster Live! cards (version 3.1)

I don't think my guide will work on a Pentium MMX that the OP has. Granted, I never tried it on such a slow system, but given that the driver pack which I use is from 2004, it's probably not a great fit. Also, VxD drivers don't work on Win 2000.

My advice is to try the official driver CD for the card, but even that might be too new since the SB0060 came out in September of 2000. It was the first SBLive 5.1 model, and those use newer drivers than the older versions of that card. The SB0100 and SB0220 came out even later.

KT7A guy was kind enough to upload the driver disk for the SB0220. That's a good card for Win9X but it can be difficult to find the VXD driver for it, so the beauty of that download is that it has those drivers and even instructions. Hopefully the Windows 2000 driver will work. I just set up a Socket 370 system with Windows 2000 and (to my pleasant surprise) Windows 2000 with SP4 had a native driver for my SB Live! CT 4670.

http://vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=8 … menustate=43,36

CallMeRive wrote on 2024-10-12, 19:36:

(I thought Win2000 would be easier and from there I'd go to Win98 and DOS...)

It's anything but. NTVDM is terrible at dos game compatibility and there are Win95-98 games too stubborn to behave on NT kernels (or support them, as there was a time when NT4 couldn't have a newer enough DirectX). Win2000 had more of a place for enthusiasts on much faster machines (~500-1000MHz) wanting to play then-current (i.e. 2000+) new Windows games with more stability.

Also a Live's a major mismatch for a P166MMX anyway. Live expects much faster (to put it in perspective, the Live 5.1 came out mere months prior to the Pentium 4 launch). The FM emulation TSR will choke the CPU on DOS games. When the P166MMX came about, Creative's big card was the ISA Sound Blaster AWE64 Gold, and PCI sound cards were barely around the corner....

chinny22 wrote on 2024-10-13, 23:50:

Maybe follow this guide?
Bouns is it'll install less bloat then the default creative ones as well

Guide: Installing Windows 9x and DOS drivers on Sound Blaster Live! cards (version 3.1)

TY, but this guide is not for Windows 2000, it's for Windows 9x (and it's recommended to use VxD architecture drivers there, but Win2K uses WDM) and DOS (which Win2K doesn't technically have).

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-10-14, 01:34:

My advice is to try the official driver CD for the card, but even that might be too new since the SB0060 came out in September of 2000. It was the first SBLive 5.1 model, and those use newer drivers than the older versions of that card. The SB0100 and SB0220 came out even later.

I've tried so many, I found only one that at least gave me the sound via manual driver install, but not the Creative software. I explain more in the end of the post.

Repo Man11 wrote on 2024-10-14, 02:36:

KT7A guy was kind enough to upload the driver disk for the SB0220. That's a good card for Win9X but it can be difficult to find the VXD driver for it, so the beauty of that download is that it has those drivers and even instructions. Hopefully the Windows 2000 driver will work. I just set up a Socket 370 system with Windows 2000 and (to my pleasant surprise) Windows 2000 with SP4 had a native driver for my SB Live! CT 4670.

http://vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=8 … menustate=43,36

I've just tried it, the result is the same - it hangs at some point. I've even tried the pack, recommended by KT7AGuy for W2K/XP, the LiveDrvUni-Pack(ENG).exe, the installer hangs too, pretty fast, but it manages to do something, because I get "PfModNT.sys couldn't be loaded" on reboot. When I try to install the drivers manually, Windows hangs installing "Creative EMU10K1 Audio Processor (WDM)".

leileilol wrote on 2024-10-14, 04:34:

CallMeRive wrote on 2024-10-12, 19:36:

(I thought Win2000 would be easier and from there I'd go to Win98 and DOS...)

It's anything but. NTVDM is terrible at dos game compatibility and there are Win95-98 games too stubborn to behave on NT kernels (or support them, as there was a time when NT4 couldn't have a newer enough DirectX). Win2000 had more of a place for enthusiasts on much faster machines (~500-1000MHz) wanting to play then-current (i.e. 2000+) new Windows games with more stability.

Well, I'm not stupid enough to run DOS games in W2K. 😀 I want is as a base stable system for the machine to be able to manipulate partitions and files of other systems and with possibility to run compatible games. I do remember using Windows 2000 almost exclusively in 2001-2002 and back then it felt very stable compared to Windows 98, especially for gaming. Actually, it feels OK even now on this Pentium, I have modern laptops that barely can run W10 at the same perceived speed. 😀

Also a Live's a major mismatch for a P166MMX anyway. Live expects much faster (to put it in perspective, the Live 5.1 came out mere months prior to the Pentium 4 launch). The FM emulation TSR will choke the CPU on DOS games. When the P166MMX came about, Creative's big card was the ISA Sound Blaster AWE64 Gold, and PCI sound cards were barely around the corner....

That's a very good point. I remember having a Live! card at some point, but probably it was after my Pentium MMX back then.
AWE64 Gold and some other variants cost an arm and a leg here. For example, I got these SBs as junk in a natural supermarket plastic bag, smelling of weed, full of cables, old memory and coolers, all for $10, so that's my level of budget. 😀 I might be able to find a Value version, like CT4520, for $30 and then later, if I feel like it, I could get some custom memory for it... This is something to think about, TY!

So, about the WORKING drivers. The only package that at least gave me sound so far has been "Sound Blaster Live! Install (VXD 4.12.01.0905 + WDM) Retail CD" (http://vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=805). Again, not a single installer works there, but at least the drivers can be instlled manually, from the Wdmdrv folder. Interesting that it installs the "Creative SB Live! Series(WDM)" driver and it's unsigned and doesn't display its info properly.

There is an even older one, from 2000, it's only for SB0060 of all my cards, but it's worth a try.

initial requirements were p133 for 9x, p200 for nt4: https://docs.rs-online.com/cd7a/0900766b80033242.pdf

however, this later document from 2003 mentions p2 350, or a 450mhz k6 interestingly: https://files.creative.com/manualdn/Manuals/T … k%20English.pdf

so looking up the documentation files on all of the driver discs you tried would give a hint. as far as viability on pentium mmx goes, while not ideal for playing EAX games, i could see the card working fine if MIDI duties under NT were the focus. it should still offload everything and compared to AWE64 you get twice the voices and can actually use soundfonts without having to pay through the nose for one of these SIMMCONN clones.

CallMeRive wrote on 2024-10-12, 19:36:

So I've started my retro build and immediately run into a problem: I cannot find properly working Creative software (a disc) for […]
Show full quote

So I've started my retro build and immediately run into a problem: I cannot find properly working Creative software (a disc) for my system. I have a Pentium MMX 166 on Iwill P55XB2 with 256 MB of RAM. So far it's running Windows 2000 SP4. I use imaging software to restore the system from the image after every failed attempt.

I've tried several Creative discs, from here and from the Internet Archive. The result is always the same: Creative installers just hang the system completely while installing the drivers and the software. I've tried different W2K installations (fresh SP4 and very old SP2 from 2003) with basically the same results. If the system's on FAT32, the failed driver install destroys Windows after a cold reboot. If the system's on NTFS, it would boot with the "PfModNT.sys couldn't be loaded" error.

I found one package for SB0100, from which I was able to install drivers manually - I got sound, but no Creative software (it's mixer etc). It also worked for SB0060.

So far the results are:

SB0060 - sound with manually installed Creative drivers, but Creative installers hang (no software), then sometimes on reboot "PfModNT.sys couldn't be loaded"
SB0100 - sound with manually installed Creative drivers, but Creative installers hang (no software), then sometimes on reboot "PfModNT.sys couldn't be loaded"
SB0220 - no sound, nothing works (tried some other drivers, circulating on the internets, the installers hang, then on reboot "PfModNT.sys couldn't be loaded", manual installation doesn't work, also tried old kx project, 3536 - installs, but doesn't pick up the device, doesn't do anything, 3534 installs, then errors out with an unspecified error).

Maybe I'm missing some big picture here. As for the P166MMX, I suspect that maybe the sofware was compiled using extented command sets that Pentium MMX lacks.

(I thought Win2000 would be easier and from there I'd go to Win98 and DOS...)

P.S. And the same result for Audigy 2 ZS, but Creative software and drivers literally have "at least Pentium 2" system requirement.

the SB0220 is a dell version not sure about the other two, i've heard it uses a different device id, thats probably why the drivers dont work with that card at all, u probably have to try the dell drivers if you haven't already, i'd just avoid those models altogether, i use a CT4620 and CT4760 and never had problems with the drivers from dos/95 upto win11, they just work.

Just to sum it up, the CPU in my case (Pentium-166MMX, 233MMX) is the problem for the Creative software.

I tested the same drivers on a Core2Duo PC (unfortunately don't have any Pentiums 2, 3, 4) running clean Windows 2000 SP4 - and I was able to use the installer without hanging the machine, got the full Creative set of software in case of SB0060 and SB0200. The SB0220 didn't work, even when the drivers were successfully installed - on a playback attempt it produced a bunch of very high pitched sounds and the machine halted. I didn't look into SB0220 any further.

The final result so far seems to be that you can make SB0060 and SB0100 work under Windows 2000 on a Pentium MMX CPU, but only by installing drivers manually, you cannot use any installers. You won't get any Creative software, won't even be able to load MIDI sound banks.

For SB0060 you can use these drivers (manual install from the folder with the driver files): http://vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=512
For SB0100 (and SB0060 again) - these drivers: http://vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=805

I didn't try other operating systems.

I ended up getting a CT4520 (AWE64) and the memory module for it. It works in Windows 2000 flawlessy - you don't need any drivers. Tho, to be able to load soundfonts you need to use AWE control panel for Windows NT 4.0 (Using the AWE32 wavetable synthesizer in Windows 2000 , http://sannata.org/articles/sb_awe64_xp_soundfonts.shtml).

But I'm thinking about trying the first SB Live! cards - CT4620 or CT4670 (the last one costs nothing right now) - just for the sake of it. 😀 They are old enough to be supported by Windows 2000 by defaut, and maybe the software can be ported from NT 4 too.

if that's really the issue it's strange that K6 is listed as being supported, because it's not 686 compatible either.

auron wrote on 2024-11-25, 23:19:

if that's really the issue it's strange that K6 is listed as being supported, because it's not 686 compatible either.

You might be right. On one side, the crashes (actually the halts) happen when I try to use Creative installers - some crash immediately, others crash at some stage of installation. On another side there's the issue of PCI standards - these old Pentium 1 motherboards support 2.1 maximum (don't quote me on that) and the SB cards, I think, are at least PCI 2.2. But again, then why do the cards function at all when you install those drivers manually?

It's all pretty strange.

440BX is still PCI 2.1 so that can't be the issue. also, both documents i had linked list PCI 2.1 as the requirement anyway.

if you can find any K6 processor, this should in theory get the driver install to work. i know these are considered to be not 686 compatible due to lacking the CMOV instruction, but maybe there are some other 686 instructions which the K6 has but pentium MMX doesn't.

the other option would be that they had a special 3dnow! path for them, since they do list a 450 mhz (effectively K6-2 minimum) requirement, but i can't judge how realistic something like that would be.

ive got a socket 7 with a K6 233 or 266mhz i forget, i tried one of my live cards it was either the CT4620 or CT4760 i used the liveware 3.0 cd, the only problem i had is that the IRQ's needed for dos games were reserved for the ISA slots, the SBlive was being assigned IRQ's between 11 and 17, so i couldnt select the needed IRQ's for dos games, had no problems with sound for win 98 tho, i also tried a CMI8738 and i had the same problem with IRQ's,

any lock ups or crashes or freezes are most likely caused by IRQ/memory conflicts, as that usually seems to be the case especially when SB16 installs, which is a definite indication something is conflicting. try changing to a different PCI slot and in the bios see if you can assign an IRQ to the slot your using (either IRQ7 or 5) if theres an option in the bios to reserve IRQ's do this for IRQ's 5,7,10,11, this will stop any onboard features using them, the sound card in windows will be assigned either IRQ10 or 11 and the dos side will be assigned hopefully IRQ7 or even 5, other issue is some SB models (non CT) i've heard are problematic especially as its a problem when finding good drivers .

if the sblive doesnt work, dont rule out a CMI8738, i just switched my CT4620 out for one, the OPL3 is superior, pure dos drivers are broken tho, since youve got and ISA card for that probably doesnt matter.